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Reviews For: CHA EMCOMM III PORTABLE (CHAMELEON ANTENNA)

Category: Antennas: HF Portable (not mobile)

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Review Summary For : CHA EMCOMM III PORTABLE (CHAMELEON ANTENNA)
Reviews: 8MSRP: 139
Description:
The EMCOMM III Portable antenna is a portable High Frequency (HF)
antenna specially designed for short to long range portable and man-
pack HF communications. The EMCOMM III Portable antenna is ideal
for hiking, backpacking, and both tent and Recreational Vehicle (RV)
camping. It is also highly suitable for military, government agencies,
non- governmental organizations (NGOs), Military Affiliate Radio
System (MARS), Civil Air Patrol (CAP), Amateur Radio Emergency
Service (ARES) / Radio Amateur Civil Emergency Service (RACES),
Salvation Army Team Emergency Radio Network (SATERN), and
amateur radio operators (hams) involved in field communication and
disaster preparedness.



The EMCOMM III Portable antenna is configurable to facilitate Near-
Vertical Incident Sky wave (NVIS) communication and will support most
Automatic Link Establishment (ALE), frequency-hopping, and spread-
spectrum modes and operations. An antenna tuner or coupler may be
required for in some instances. The EMCOMM III Portable antenna can
be deployed by the operator in the field in less than 15 minutes, using
almost any available support, with no masts or guying required.



The EMCOMM III Portable antenna is comprised of a matching
transformer, a 73 foot antenna wire on a line winder, and a 25 foot
counterpoise - making a highly portable and effective HF antenna
system.



Specifications:

Frequency: 10M - 160M

Power: 100W SSB or 50W CW

Length: 73’ + 25" Copper Clad KEVLAR PTFE (Teflon) (-70°C to 150°C)
wire

Weight: 1.5 Lb.



The antenna system consists of:

1 X CHA EMCOMM III matching box

1 X 73' Copper Clad KEVLAR Wire (Radiator)

1 X 25' Copper Clad KEVLAR Wire (Counterpoise)
Product is in production
More Info: http://chameleonantenna.com/
# last 180 days Avg. Rating last 180 days Total reviews Avg. overall rating
0084.8
K4GTE Rating: 2023-09-14
Great Antenna From A Great Company Time Owned: more than 12 months.
Outstanding antenna, works great, compact, easy to set up. Works well on all bands with no tuner needed. Perfect for emcom/pota/sota/portable. Great customer service. Chameleon is a very good, reputable USA company.
VE7KOA Rating: 2023-09-14
More work than it is worth Time Owned: 6 to 12 months.
It must be just me but I really have not had very good results with this antenna. I contacted Chameleon when I first got this and could not get it to tune, they got back to me very quickly with suggestions and I can now get it to tune, but no-one can hear me. I have great receive on all bands. Have tried multiple configurations but just can't get it to work even 1/2 as well as a simple dipole.

The green wire may look cool and be good if your are trying to hide, but OMG trying to set up input the bush, I keep loosing the antenna in the grass and tripping over it.

Build quality is good, but it is just not for me.
KC0TRK Rating: 2021-06-06
Fits Perfectly Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
I've had the III Portable for about 30 days. The first thing that I noticed upon opening the box was the fantastic workmanship! This antenna will outlast me. I rigged it from the eave of the house to a dead tree. A perfect fit!!! The SWR was flat about 2.0 across all bands. I hooked it up to my new ICOM 705. Good signals. The first contact from Littleton was to a ham about an hour northeast of Ottowa with 5 watts. Liked it so much that I invested in the CHA MPAS (MODULAR PORTABLE ANTENNA SYSTEM) 2.0 for our road trips.
AD0DQ Rating: 2019-09-30
Great Antenna, Great Customer Service Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
I bought this to go with my Xiegu QRP radio and I now use it for a stealth antenna at my residence. The black wire disappears from view against a background of trees. My 25 watt PSK signal is heard as far west as Hawaii (I am in Alabama) and as far east as European Russia.
I bought mine from Amazon, and when it arrived the wire was broken. I called the company and they sent another wire right out. You can't get better customer service than that!
I put the wire on and took it out the second story window on my house out to about 30 feet in a nearby tree. So runs basically 90 degrees to 270 degrees and I am surprised that it gets as good a signal out to the west as it does. I've had numerous FT8 QSOs on 40 meters with stations in California.
My SWR on 40 meters - 10 meters has been terrific, usually less than 2:1. On 80 meters its 3:1, so I use a tuner there and it works just fine. I enjoy using this antenna and I am now in the position of having to buy another one to go in my go bag. But I will happily buy this antenna. It isn't often that a wire antenna checks off all the boxes for me, but this one sure does.
VE3IPS Rating: 2019-03-25
Best Portable Antenna System for rapid Deployment Time Owned: more than 12 months.
Please note that this rugged and mil-spec antenna may need a tuner based on the configuration and height above ground.

Its very simple to toss a wire into a tree, connect to your rig and start making contacts.

The flexibility allows multiple configurations and it wont break down or fall apart when you use it.

I did a JOTA event and I had the scouts take to the task to get it up in the tree.

We made over 100 contacts on 40m and 20m with the LDG tuner in auto mode so it was foolproof.

The other team that had a setup for the same event had water issues with their hambrew balun and the wire broke when pulling it through the tree. Not rain friendly

So they made no contacts and were miserable. Weeks of planning effort went out the window when the antenna is broken.

I love this Chameleon stuff because it just works
AE7YD Rating: 2018-08-10
works great Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
For 20m I have a HF14 at 32ft but I needed something for the
other bands. I had 9:1 balun with an endfed inverted L but
couldn't make it work on 30m and if it worked on 30 I was
loosing another band. I have a tuner at the base.
After the surprising good results of my CHA Micro I decided
to try the Chameleon EMCOMM III. I installed it at the base of
the mast with the LDG Z11-Pro Tuner and a remote switch.
The wire is as an inverted L as before at 24ft between 2 fiber
glass telescopic poles. You might say what's the difference,
well the difference is that it works on all bands with the same
tuner and comparing the results on WSPR as well as RBN and
real QSOs proves it.
AF2DX Rating: 2018-06-15
BEST ANTENNA I USED Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
I did not buy the The EMCOMM III antenna.
I won it because Carl had a contest going on.
I had it close to 3 weeks but did not use it due to very bad band conditions.
I went fishing yesterday and I decided to take the antenna since it took up very little room.
I put a long kite string on my fishing pole with a 2oz weight and on the first try i got the line over the limb that stuck straight out..
The antenna was almost near vertical and I just tossed the counterpoise on the ground.
In was only 45 feet away from a very large lake and no power lines near by.
I sent my call several times then I fished for a while.
Went back to the rig and sent my call a few more times.
I heard what I thought was a German call DL4WK.
QSB pulled the contact out but I looked up the call and on QRZ this ham has a massive antenna farm so i'm sure that was the right call.
The E comm III is a very well built antenna and you can see the excellent workmanship.
I'm sure this will be my only antenna since I think I can make it hum good on all bands with no tuner
I just wish the bands were better.
SWR on most bands were at or close to 2.0 but I found that moving the counterpoise wire just about gave me a 1.3 to 1
I had my vintage MFJ 160-10-S tuner but did not need it.
No real 2 way QSO was made due to conditions but I had the chance to try it out and I felt happy my 30 watts was heard over 4,000 miles away.
Rig was my FT 891 and a 22 AMP Jell AGM battery.
73 BOB AF2DX
WJ6F Rating: 2018-04-23
Perfect for go boxes & hiking Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
This antenna is perfect for using in a go bag/box, hiking, camping or just to use in your own back yard or local park! It is not only light weight and compact, but it is easy on the wallet! It takes no time to set up and can be taken down even quicker. It can easily be set up as an Inverted “L” / Sloping Wire, End-Fed Inverted “V” and Horizontal End-Fed (NVIS). There are several accessories that Chameleon antenna offers to enhance this antenna!